This invention relates generally to hand-held ice scrapers which are particularly used in cold climates to clean ice from automotive windshields and other surfaces.
Ice scrapers, which apply forces parallel to the surface, for cleaning ice from automobile windshields and other glass surfaces are well-known in the art. Most such scrapers employ a fixed blade arrangement attached to some form of handle. Such blade scrapers are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,164,801 to Thomas and U.S. Pat. No. 4,275,476 to Hopkins and Thomas. Certain of these patents also disclose fixed ice chippers generally mounted on the blade section. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,275,476 to Hopkins and Thomas which discloses a fixed ice chipper which is used to deflect and break up the ice as the ice travels up the scraper blade after having been lifted from the windshield or other surface. These fixed chippers are used to break up the ice after it has been scraped off of the surface by the blade. The basic action, however, of these scrapers is parallel to the surface being scraped.
There are formations of ice, however, which almost defy removal by parallel scraping action. Generally these ice formations are described as "glazed" ice or "ice sheets" and are commonly produced by "freezing rain" or moisture striking a surface which is below freezing. Many times such glazed ice is relatively thin but no reasonable amount of parallel scraping action will allow the scraper to crush or impinge upon the edge of the ice to lift the ice from the surface. Such common blade scrapers are primarily designed to produce forces generally parallel to the surface being scraped and as such must first break through or crush the ice before they are effective.
It is an object of this invention to provide an improved ice scraper which applies primarily vertical forces to the ice through the use of notched-like rollers which break up the ice so it can then be more readily removed by the parallel scraping action of the common fixed blade scraper.